Industrial heritage museum proposed in Lorain

LORAIN -- A new museum celebrating the industrial heritage of the Midwest could find a home on Lorain's waterfront.

Members of the Downtown Lorain Consortium on Tuesday heard a pitch from Chuck Sword, director of the Ohio Museum of Transportation & Industry.

The museum exists now as a nonprofit corporation but Sword and other museum supporters hope someday to build a permanent complex of themed pavilions to showcase the cars, ships, planes, trains and heavy machinery built in the Buckeye State.

"It's still somewhat of a dream," said Sword, owner of DHS Diecast, a Berea-based maker and dealer of scale models of trucks, tractors and industrial cranes.

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The museum would feature displays with the actual items. A brief conceptual video showed classic cars, but also an excavator that visitors could operate and a biplane that would simulate flight.

"Our idea is to tell people about it and see what happens," Sword said. He has proposed the museum around the Cleveland area and yesterday was his first presentation to the Downtown Lorain Consortium, a group of business owners and residents dedicated to restoring Broadway and downtown.

"I think the idea and the concept that we have still works," he said. "Lorain is a logical location. It makes sense. The history is certainly here from a transportation and industry perspective."

The project met with a good reception but also questions from the consortium members.

"It's something we're definitely going to look at," said Jim Long, president of the Lorain Growth Corp. "I think we should be in the running for it with the other northeast Ohio cities."

Sword has made contact with Lorain's city administration and the Port Authority.

Plans are preliminary, and Sword said he hopes to raise $30,000 to pay for a business plan next year, then have a location in place by the end of 2013.

The project is expensive -- possibly up to $100 million when complete -- but planners are aware of that, Sword said. He hopes to find corporate contributors that would sponsor the museum, along with possible government and foundation grants.

"I think it's a very interesting concept, and it has merit," said Rick Novak, executive director of the Lorain Port Authority. "The question is, where would it go? And the funding for it."

Lorain officials and residents previously have debated about attracting a museum to the city's waterfront.

Kenosha, Wis., a city that local officials want to use as a model for Lorain's waterfront redevelopment, has two museums, Novak said.

Lorain was to become the new home of the Inland Seas Maritime Museum and Great Lakes Historical Society, but museum officials changed direction and are moving to Toledo for more room and hoping to attract more people.